all right. we asked you for what you're seeing with hurricane sandy. what did you get? >> sherry says up watching she from the airport in san francisco, can't get a flight home. these pictures are breaking my heart. and i'm watching from africa, visiting family here, trying to make sure that everyone at home is okay. >> unfortunately, we don't know yet. we hope everyone is okay. we've heard 16 deaths so far, that spans from north carolina up to connecticut. we're still wading through it all, tower. >> twitter was wild yesterday, watching everything unfold from people in new york. you actually tweeted out, a shot at one of the transformer explosions on manhattan's side. >> yeah, bill karins was talking about this. i was outside at about 9:00 last night at riverside park on the west side of manhattan, what you're looking at in the foreground is the hudson river looking across to new jersey. that was one of the transformer or power station explosions.

you saw them about every ten minutes, some of them were white, some of them were green, some of them were red and then you'd see entire towns along the river in new jersey go black. much more on sandy much right now on "morning joe." i am not worried at this point about the impact on the election. i'm worried about the impact on families and i'm worried about the impact on our first responders. . i'm worried about the impact on our economy and on transportation. you know, the election will take care of itself next week. right now, our number one priority is to make sure that we are saving lives, that our search and rescue teams are going to be in place, that people are going to get the food, the water, the shelter they need in case of emergency and that we respond as quickly as possible to get the economy back on track. good morning, it's tuesday, october 30th. welcome to "morning joe." with us onset, we have msnbc

contributor mike barnicle and senior political analyst mark haleprin. we'll begin, of course, with a wrap-up of the night and the hurricane sandy is now classified as a post tropical cyclone. pushing inland through pennsylvania after a night of destruction that hasn't even begun to be assessed. the storm left 7.1 million people without power. sandy slammed into the new jersey shore last night with winds of 80 miles per hour. and more in some places bringing with it an overwhelming surge. "the associated press" reports at least 16 u.s. deaths are now being blamed on sandy across seven states. the combination of flood waters and a loss of electricity created an urgent situation for a new york city hospital. the staff at nyu langone medical center was forced to evacuate hundreds of patients overnight including infants from the neo natal intensive care unit after backup power failed.

they are still evacuating patients as we speak. we'll get to more on that in a moment, but first, let's go straight to meteorologist bill karins for the very latest. bill? >> good morning to you guys. and it's just starting to settle in. and once these pictures come in, it's just going to be incredible. the kind of damage that sandy created. over my shoulder here, you're looking at one of the strongest storms to go through the mid-atlantic region and caused the most destruction of our lifetime. this has never happened for a storm like this in the jersey shore of this intensity. lowest pressure readings ever in philadelphia and atlantic city, new jersey, and the storm surge, the highest ever measured in areas like new york city. that is so rare. and the effects we're just beginning to realize. and wait until we find out how long it's going to take for the new york subway to get running again. let's take you through the concerns this morning. 95% of the damage has been done. we still have a little bit more damage to be done at this early high tide cycle, especially as we go throughout northern portions of the forecast area, that's up along the connecticut coast.

possibly around long island and the new york city harbor. that's at 9:07 this morning. also, we now have 7 million people without power as we head toward november and the temperatures get cold this time of year, the 40s are in place over pittsburgh, philadelphia, all the way down to d.c. windchills in the 30s, especially down around the delmarva region. that's cold, chilly air to be in your house at night. a lot of people probably had a lot of warmth last night and now it is freezing. they're going to have to find somewhere else to stay, not going to be an option, especially if you have young kids to stay in your house if you don't have heat. not advised for anyone to be traveling in the areas of west virginia or portions of southern ohio. we have a full-fledged snowstorm. this is all the moisture from the hurricane thrown back into the cold air. now we've got a full-fledged blizzard going on in the appalachians through charleston and even a lot more snow than we

were expecting in southern ohio and trying to sneak into kentucky. i guess you guys kind of see the big picture here, we're getting done with a very historic storm, i'm sure the name will be retired. one of the worst storms ever to hit this region. and we'll see the sun-up pictures and the jersey shore is the area of greatest concern. >> so came along the jersey shore, storm surges going into new york harbor and causing the damage that was caused in the southern part of manhattan. what about up the connecticut coastline? what do the storm surges look like? not only in long island sound on the connecticut side but obviously on the long island side. >> yes, the long island side looks like it was bad. and especially talking about houses going into the ocean at fire island. other areas we haven't heard too much about the hamptons, not too many reports out of there. the high tide cycle was later, the high tide cycle in connecticut was closer to midnight. both reports have been slower to

come in, less people along the coast, they evacuated. not like new york city where everyone was right there to witness it. we had a high tide about 9 feet above average in the new haven area, fairfield area, right along the coast in greenwich, we had a rush of water, homes that burned, million dollar homes right down along the coast there that caught fire, firefighters couldn't get to rescue them. so those areas also got devastated too. but i think if we're going to have the one lasting memory of this storm, you're looking at it right here, last night, breezy point, queens, right near jfk airport. winds were gusting to 50 miles per hour, this was in an evacuation zone. but i know for a fact following twitter last night, there were people in these houses when these fires were starting panicking, trying to figure out where to go, what to do. it's a very small sliver of island and there wasn't a lot of room for people to escape. i'm very afraid if people got caught in these flames last night. again, 50 homes that burned. the firefighters got there, did not have water pressure. they had to try to pump water

out of the oceans using their engines, it was a nightmare scenario for these firefighters in 50-mile-per-hour winds. that's going to be the legacy and then we'll see what the helicopters show us this morning and this afternoon when they fly along the jersey shore. i don't think there's many communities that went unscathed. many of them are reporting extreme damage on their boardwalk. the mayor was on this morning saying he can't believe it and they're going to have to probably rebuild most of this. >> and it's hard to imagine the fire, the massive fire in the rock aways. firefighters were rushed out there early this morning, more than 50 homes destroyed, it was a six-alarm fire around 3:30 a.m., and it still has not been contained. >> and i was reading reports overnight, the governor of new jersey very upset because certain people didn't evacuate. for people who did not and are holed up, it could be a long haul for them. >> i didn't even mention atlantic city.

atlantic city had the high tide yesterday morning that shocked us. in the morning high tide cycle the pier broke apart and water rushed into the streets and then they had the higher one on top of it last night that we haven't seen the pictures of. think about the economy down there. those casinos have been struggling anyways, they built a brand new big one and now this? the economy down there is going to be devastated probably for months if not a couple of years to come. >> all right. >> and willie, of course, the worst disaster in subway history. unbelievable. the mta -- look at that picture. on tuesday the storm was the worst disaster in new york city subway system history. and who knows how long it's going to be until the subways are reopen in new york. >> you know, one of the things -- and we realize, you know, this is one sliver of this great country of ours, but one of the things in seeing these pictures and seeing the pictures from the langone medical center in manhattan, nurses carrying

out infants from the pediatric unit. >> battery operated ventilators. >> firefighters out in the rock aways, when we go to cover as we will politics and the presidential election, it should be framed up with the thought in mind that there are millions of people in this country who never not for a single day shrink from their responsibilities. the nurses, the police officers, the firefighters, the first responders. the people who hold things together in the midst of chaos, the chaos we saw yesterday. >> and they were working on getting the patients out all night. it took about six hours to get 70 patients out. one-by-one gliding them down on basic kind of sleds almost down flights and flights of stairs while trying to keep them alive. they're still doing it at this hour. >> as you said with hand ventilators. >> with hand ventilators and other apparatus.

>> jack was in the nicu for about six months. and the thought that you would have to unhook these tiny babies who are struggling for life who every moment parents are sitting there hoping that they continue breathing and then in the middle of the storm to remove them from what has been effect their life support and walk them down ten flights of stairs and try to keep them alive while you go to another nicu. >> the process was calm and methodical, but absolutely nobody was losing their cool. bill, you were also showing images that popped up on the screen there. one of them was ground zero and water rushing in. i mean, just completely submerging practically lower manhattan. the impact and the damage that water can cause, we have yet to even understand what will happen. not only in new york city where we are right now, there's the image i'm talking about, but up

and down the coastline. >> i was actually there when that happened. i was down in battery park when the high tide was coming in, and i was trying to rush back to the studios and beat it before i got trapped and we were going right by there. drove by there, about 2 feet of water. and it was just surreal how the water was flowing through. people don't realize, lower manhattan doesn't have much elevation. it's very flat and that's what battery parked looked like. as soon as it went over the edge, it filled up in a hurry. joe was mentioning the subways. in the middle of the night, we had an interview with a guy from the mta, they have six tunnels right now that are flooded with all the water that surged. the way they get that water out, pumped it out. that could take up to four days possibly. if you're talking about a four-day disruption for millions of people not to be able to work, not to be able to move on with their lives. a lot of people take subways to school in different boroughs in new york city. this is going to last well to election day. i'm just talking about new york city.

who knows how long it's going to be for power to be restored in areas of connecticut and new jersey to have a lot of trees. >> all right, bill, we'll be back with you. thank you so much. i know you've been working through the night since the last time we saw you yesterday. >> great job, bill. >> bill karins. >> to mike's point about the firefighters too. if you were watching live television last night at 11:30 at night or so, you can see live on television, as you said, mika. nurses bring these babies out cradling them, running through the rain, getting into ambulances, ambulances that had lined up down first avenue from other hospitals so they could come rescue. you would see firefighters running in to a building in chelsea whose facade at come off completely leaving it look like a doll house. the front of a building comes off, firefighters within five seconds turn and run into the building. we have incredible people serving us and we're very lucky in new york city. >> aren't they unbelievable? >> okay.

it's 12 past the hour. we're going to make a turn to politics and quite frankly how the weather and politics collide in this case. we've got one week to go until the presidential election if you can believe it in the middle of all of this. new polls this morning on how close the race is. the tracking poll is likely voters has romney up by 5 percentage points. a new washington post abc tracking poll of likely voters has the race even at 49% apiece, a pew research center survey has the candidates not among likely voters, 47% each, can you believe this? and it's still hard to get a sense as to who has the upper hand in key swing states. in florida, a cnn/orc poll has romney up by just one point well within the margin of error. and in north carolina, where democrats held their convention last month, a university poll has it even 45% to 45%.

>> mark haleprin, can't get much closer everywhere. >> i mean -- >> and minnesota, minnesota is not even a key swing state. you've got bill clinton going in because a new poll shows mitt romney within the margin of error in minnesota. plus, you have some information about some space where the republicans are about to start rushing in and putting up campaign ads that are not states that the obama team thought they would have to worry about one week out. >> we're going to go into election day not knowing. i don't care how rabid a partisan you are, we're going to go into election day not knowing who is going to win this. the race is simply too close, too many variables and the storm has a lot of new ones. we just can focus on what we see. one thing we see is democrats are playing a little bit more definition than they thought

they would. and if you bring those states in to the electoral college picture, minnesota, pennsylvania, maybe michigan, where republican allies of mitt romney are now going on the offensive, it changes the electoral college outlook quite a bit. not saying governor romney's going to win any of those. they say we're not going to lose these states, it's all silly. i think if governor romney's allies went on television in california, they wouldn't be inclined to play defense there. they feel a little bit of vulnerability in those states. and again, if you take the non-battlegrounds, expand the map a little bit to include pennsylvania, minnesota, and maybe michigan, it's a much different calculation. >> karl rove is going to be putting up ads in pennsylvania now, the president is putting up ads in pennsylvania now. >> yep. >> suddenly the keystone state is the final week out up for grabs. why? not up for grabs yet, the polls show it close. but both sides realize that it's

not safe anymore. >> what's the big deal to last week, we have enough money to go there. it's not the money on television, that's not nothing, it's the candidate's time, joe biden going to scranton. i suspect if things keep on the current trajectory, the president might have to go to pennsylvania, bill clinton might have to be there repeatedly. every day they're spending in pennsylvania is a day they're not spending in ohio. the republicans believe, not just rove's group, but some of the others, they believe there's a possibility to at a minimum keep the president on the -- having to not just focus on ohio. and if they can distract him away from ohio to play defense in these other places, they can increase their chances. the democrats totally dismiss this, but there's a reality. they're playing defense. >> you can say dismissive, but mike barnicle, the fact that democrats would put their key asset, bill clinton -- >> in pennsylvania. >> in minnesota today, two stops

in minnesota today, that's -- that's worrisome for the democrats. >> yeah. if you -- if you're taking one of your principal assets, the president and the vice president frozen now, the key asset not only your principal asset, your key asset, but one really big asset and you're moving him to a state otherwise thought to be in your pocket a week or ten days ago, you don't have to be a genius and certainly i'm no genius to realize they are looking at internals that are causing them some concern. >> no doubt about it. willie, gallup is either going to look like the smartest group of people on the face of the earth or they're going to have a lot of explaining to do. the same with nate silver who now, i think, is saying that president obama has a 75% chance of winning this election. while president obama's own people would put that at 50.1%.

so how can we have these two extremes? i don't understand, how can you have these extremes? especially, you know, gallup, and we talked about nate silver, somebody i read on twitter, a liberal said he was garlic that liberals are waving around from the threat of vampires being mitt romney. >> they put a lot of faith in nate silver. his calculation is not like the gallup calculation. he's put different things into it. >> witchcraft? >> no, i'm not going to say that. but it's not reflective of the gallup poll, shall we say that. but within some of those other states, mark haleprin. if you look at colorado, talk about early voting there. we've got some reports that more republicans are voting early in colorado, the opposite true in some other states. does early voting become more important because of the storm,

does this affect anything? as a practical matter, beyond the president being sort of frozen and being the president of united states for several days and perhaps the rest of this week, what does this mean to the race? this storm. >> we'll see just how bad the damage is. ohio and florida are important early voting states and we don't think they're going to be particularly affected by this. my sense is based on the level of damage, thank goodness the minimal loss of life, my sense is that by tomorrow with the exception of virginia, i don't know that any battleground states will be really impacted by the storm in terms of early vote advertising, candidate visit, except for virginia. >> okay. we've got two other stories we want to get to. first one of the hardest fought races in the country. a new boston globe poll shows republican senator scott brown narrowly leading elizabeth warren 45% to 43% in the massachusetts u.s. senate race. brown trailed by five points a month ago. and while the same poll shows

president obama with a 14-point lead over mitt romney, 52-38, the former governor's support has grown by eight points there since last month. >> mike, i saw another poll out maybe from the university of new hampshire. i hope i'm not misquoting it. they took a poll in this race, 45%/45%. >> yeah. >> you know what? you've got to give scott brown huge props. i don't think any of us expected him to stay in the race this long with -- >> he's done an usual thinusuali think for a candidate. scott brown has managed to maintain his personal favorability. people like him. they might disagree with him ideologically, but people like him. his favorability rating, he's maintained that while going on the attack against elizabeth warren. he said some really brutal personal attack ads on elizabeth

warren. that race, my sense of it is going to come down to how well the president does in massachusetts. one of the key points in that story is that the president of the united states was leading governor romney by 23 to 25 points three or four weeks ago, that's now down to about 14 points. >> okay. >> i'm not sure that poll's right on the top of the ticket. mike's absolutely right. it's all about the top of the ticket. i think even some republicans would tell you it's not a 14-point race. if it's 14 points, i'm pretty sure brown will win. i'm sure many see it as a 20 to 25-point race. and that's why they're worried. before we go to break, a very sad note to end this block on. senator claire mccaskill, her mother betty ann died yesterday and betty ann mccaskill was the first woman elected to the columbia city council and that's sort of how she got her start in politics. they always talked about politics throughout her entire life.

>> she was here with senator mccaskill -- >> she was here. >> a year and a half ago. her mom. >> they were extremely close. >> yeah. >> very sad passing. >> our thoughts and prayers are certainly with you, senator mccaskill and the entire family. >> yep. coming up, an update on the storm response from new jersey governor chris christie. we'll also talk to chris matthews and david brooks about the state of the election with just seven days to go. plus, author of the best-selling book "the perfect storm" will be here with his thoughts on yesterday's super storm. up next, mike allen with a top stories in the politico playbook. and we'll continue to bring you updates on the hurricane throughout the morning. keep it here on "morning joe." [ woman ] ring. ring. progresso.

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let's take a look at the morning papers at 25 past the hour. "usa today," the total economic impact from the storm is expected to reach $40 billion from everything from property damage to lost economic activity. $88 billion in residential and commercial property was in sandy's path. and the "wall street journal," the new york stock exchange is closed for the second day in a row. the last time weather caused a two-day shutdown was back in 1888. >> that's a long time. >> you remember that year, mike. >> just entering college. >> yeah. >> the vanderbilt kids. >> and still, ongoing suggestions and questions about how prepared the stock market was for disaster. officials outlined a new emergency contingency plan late yesterday afternoon. the "new york times" seven subway tunnels under the east river are flooded as new york city's metropolitan transit

authority has reported as much as 4 feet of water in some stations. it could be days before the lines are operational again. the head of the mta called it the worst disaster in the subway's 108-year history. >> let's go to the politico's desk with tv's own willie geist. >> the chief white house correspondent down at politico mike allen has a look at the playbook. >> good morning, guys. >> let's talk about what this storm has done to the campaign. both president obama and mitt romney altering their campaign schedules, of course. but there are two different positions. how does this play out? >> great coverage this morning. and i have to pause and say it's sobering to see the pictures, to think about all the people with kids who can't get to a shift they may need. and it's hard to talk clinically about the politics, but go ahead and put on the stethoscope here. and point out that the campaigns are not suspended, the campaigns have been going on, they're just having to be very ginger about

how they navigate it. at the same time president obama yesterday was sending out an appeal to his campaign list for red cross donations, his campaign aides were on a conference call talking about how they're about to go up in ohio with an ad hammering romney. they also announce there as you were talking about they're going up in pennsylvania. the president has that automatic stage. we saw him acting there as commander in chief. mitt romney has to avoid looking like he's going for photo ops. looking like he's doing something cheap at a solemn time for the country. so today he's going to a rescue event in ohio. he has to be very careful. has to avoid any whiff of one of the worst moments of the campaign, which we saw here on "morning joe" when paul ryan went to a soup kitchen in ohio after the patrons were gone and

put on a crispy white apron and appeared to wash dishes that looked clean. later said they were dirty. mitt romney has to look presidential at times when it would be tempting to do a photo op. to remind you that both campaigns have a real feeling of trepidation at the moment. you pointed out numbers that looked good for romney. but that north carolina poll that you showed, romney tied right before the election, and politico, the carl rove group, up at eight states including north carolina, not a good sign, and fascinatingly, they are not advertising wisconsin, karl rove thinks it's not going to happen for mitt romney considerably narrowing his options. >> what do you make, mike, of what we were talking about earlier? pennsylvania and minnesota attracting money from both campaigns and valuable time from president clinton?

>> yeah, it's insurance by them, but i think you made a great point. the bill clinton in minnesota, an astonishing piece of resources. pennsylvania more just to keep it -- to keep the gap there from narrowing. but two places that obama campaign didn't want to be north carolina, certainly a place for the romney campaign, doesn't want to be. they would love to not have to worry about florida. we saw basically a tie there. they'd love to not be worrying about virginia. they're worrying hard about virginia. >> and north carolina too. mike allen, a look at the playbook, one week until election day. mike, thanks so much. and governor chris christie of new jersey joins us straight ahead. a very busy day ahead. >> he was out front and center all day, mixing it up with the atlantic city mayor. >> they're tight. >> we're going to get an update from governor christie just ahead on "morning joe."

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34 past the hour. a live look at the white house.

about 15 million ballots have already been cast in this election. that according to the elections project at george mason university. the data shows that democratic voters outnumber republicans in ohio, iowa, north carolina, and nevada. while the opposite is true in colorado. and while romney scaled back scheduled events last night and today out of respect for those affected by sandy, yesterday in ohio, he emphasized the importance of early voting. >> i know that early voting has begun, get out there and vote. i see a voter right there, get out and vote. we want you early, we need you. it sends a very strong message, by the way. i know your vote counts just as much cast on election day if it's cast early. but if it's cast early, all the media follows how much early voting is going on and look at your zip code and where you live and make an estimate of whether you're a republican or democrat and they decide whether you're

ahead or fall behind. we're doing well right now, so early voting makes a difference. >> mark haleprin, early voting does make a difference right now. the president's people very -- very positive. >> they were counting on -- >> about ohio, feeling good about other states, iowa. how does it break down? >> well, i mean the numbers are kind of mixed and you can't tell everything from it. and you can slice and dice it in lots of ways. but in ohio and iowa early voting for the democrats is going okay and maybe good enough to mean that it's possible for the republicans to make it up on election day. governor romney there engaged in a kind of in the weeds very sophisticated analysis, i'm not sure all the voters will pick it up. every day you want momentum because the press covers it that way. democrats are doing well on early voting, but not as well as they might be in some of these places. out west in nevada, they're doing very well. in iowa, mix, ohio, mixed, doing

very well. >> okay. let's get an update on the hurricane and the aftermath of it so far. bill karins is standing by with the very latest. bill? >> good morning, once again, we're now about an hour away from sunrise, we'll get our first daylight pictures of the devastation from last night's high tide cycle. our reporters are in place and they're starting to send back some images from their locations. one of the areas we're very concerned with is the jersey shore. mike seidel was in point pleasant beach. he says he was at this bar yesterday, it had a 30-yard wide protective dune in front of it. he thought for sure that dune would hold and protect it. he said the front wall was totally washed out and all the water went straight through the bar and the restaurant there. and if that's any indication of what the storm did to the 30-yard wide dunes which is extremely wide, all the ones smaller than that had no chance either. that's the kind of destruction we're going to see up and down the coast today. the storm is still spinning, by the way, over the top of pennsylvania. still windy, still raining, and this blizzard going on in areas

of west virginia and southern ohio. we're not done yet with everything. that fire that was in queens overnight, probably one of the legacies in this horrible season. like something from the early 1900, a blaze out of control, the firefighters had no chance, no water pressure and winds gusting to 60 miles per hour. it took city blocks out in the portion of the queens here, jfk airport, reports of 50 homes burned. no reports of injuries or fatalities, this was an evacuation zone, hopefully everybody got out of the way. obviously not if people didn't listen to the orders this time around and probably some people were there. as far as the storm goes, guys, the other thing to watch this morning on the tail end of "morning joe," it won't be as bad as last night, but expect a little more minor damage. >> bill, thank you very much. we'll be talking to you once again very soon. we'll be right back with the must-read opinion pages. keep it here on "morning joe." [ male announcer ] with 160 more miles per tank,

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marie callender's. it's time to savor. he's running an ad in this state saying that, saying that president obama made the companies go bankrupt. gave the industry the italians who are selling it to the chinese. whoa. whoa. as we say in my faith, bless me father for i have sinned -- what are you talking about? i have never seen anything like that. it's an absolutely false

assertion. >> should those two really allowed to be on the same stage? >> yes, they should. >> should they be allowed -- >> i tweeted yesterday, there's almost no one in the democratic party who would follow bill clinton and not be the least bit intimidated. he stepped right up and -- >> boom. >> kapowy. >> look at bill. look at bill. >> they're dangerous. look at this. >> i got the still shot. >> that's fantastic. >> yeah. >> all right. so that was good. >> that's the way they used to be. >> it is time now for the must-read opinion pages. i've got one that might upset you a little bit and one that you might like. how's that? a little bit for everybody. all right. now, okay, "new york times."

a big storm requires big government. disaster coordination is one of the most vital functions of big government, which is why mitt romney wants to eliminate it. at a republican primary debate last year, mr. romney was asked whether emergency management was a function that should be returned to the states. he not only agreed, he went further. mr. romney not only believes that states acting independently can handle the response to a vast east coast storm better than washington, but that companies can do an even better job. he said it was immoral for the federal government to do all these things if it means increasing the debt. many don't like the idea of free aid for poor people or think people should pay for their bad decisions, which this week includes living on the east coast. >> what do you want me to say? >> nothing. i really don't want you to say anything. >> no, i want to say something. >> okay. go ahead and say something. >> that's absolutely ridiculous. >> okay. >> i think what mitt romney is absolutely ridiculous. >> oh.

okay. >> this is what happens, though, when you're afraid to go after medicare, medicaid and social security and defense spending and reform taxes to bring more revenue to the federal government, you have to rely on the 11%, 12% of the federal government that is discretionary. so what do you end up doing? since you're not going to tell the truth about having to cut medicare, medicaid, social security, defense spending, you know, reforming the tax code to bring in more revenue to the federal government, you've got to go after fema, which actually fema's not driving us into debt, look at the numbers. you've got to go after big bird, big bird's not driving us into debt, go after -- >> not going after the firefighters -- >> you've got to go where the money is. you rob the banks because that's where the money is. if you want to save america, you have to go where the money is. that's health care, that's medicare, medicaid, social security. you've got to reform them in a way. and i'm not saying voucher systems, this is about math. you've got to reform them in a

way that would save those systems, save this country. and then you got to go after defense spending. fema, come on. this is ridiculous. really? seriously? we want delaware governor, new jersey's governor fighting -- no. you need the federal government to step in and help coordinate. i've been in the middle of these calls. >> yeah. >> when you have killer storms coming toward the coastline. i've been in the middle of these calls, and let me tell you something, you've got to have somebody out of washington coordinating the whole thing. and if you don't, there's a disaster. let's just look at what happened at hurricane katrina. >> yeah. >> let's look at what happened to hurricane katrina. you know what, though? again this is part of a bigger problem with mitt romney right now and republicans and democrats that are afraid to talk about how you really save this country and tackle the debt. instead, they talked about silly things like cutting fema, cutting big bird or saying we're going to take care of all of our

problems by raising some taxes on rich people. instead of talking about saving this country for the next generation. >> and also not being honest about defense. >> and both sides not being honest about defense. >> okay. thank you. >> how's that? >> good. >> i don't define fema as quote big government. >> right. >> i define entitlement programs by their numbers that are going to cripple us as, quote, big government. >> "wall street journal," barack obama -- when the history of this administration is written, maybe someone will note the difference. here is that man who promised a transformative presidency, and it amounted to a two-prong attempt to impose from one side a version of european social democracy by way of obama care. and from the other side a version of chinese state-directed capitalism by the way of stimulus. mr. obama might squeak by.

he has in addition to incumbency and a vestige of likability, a candidate who found his stride late in the campaign. but a second term will mean four years of spent ideas packaged in shopworn rhetoric to be shoved down the throat by a president who has nothing politically to lose. i'm not sure that's fair. would you agree with that? i don't think so. >> i would agree that the president's exhausted intellectually when it comes to what he plans to do for the next our years. i think there's a big question mark, though, also over what mitt romney would do over the next four years. only thing we know for sure is mitt romney's saying he's going to cut taxes and barack obama says he's going to raise taxes and neither one of these -- >> that's the argument in the messaging out on the campaign trail. but when you look at what this president has done -- >> no, no, no, no -- just stop. >> what? >> just stop.

i'm talking about the future. you want to talk about the past. if i say the president's intellectually exhausted and he has no plans for the next four years, please don't make my point by talking about what he did the first two years. >> no, i'm not. >> what's he going to do the next four years? >> i'm asking if the framework of the past four years, for example -- >> no, no, no, what's he going to do the next four years? >> he's going to try, number one, do taxes on the rich, number two, going to continue to try to reach his goal of exports, they're at 43% right now, they want to get 50% and more to help build out middle class businesses. >> he's got nothing. you can say he's got nothing. >> you're absolutely wrong. >> anybody here? does he got anything? >> are you crazy? are you out of your mind. >> no. >> the fiscal class -- >> energy and immigration. >> you know why? do you want to know why, joe? because he's going to have no choice. nor are the republican counterparts.

>> well -- >> they're going to have no choice. >> what's that? >> he has issued a pamphlet. i got one when i was going to the bar and handing out pamphlets to me. let's compare the rate of unemployment, let's compare the 2 million people who are now being re-educated to get back into the workforce, let's compare what he's done for women, let's compare exports, let's compare the car industry and now them even exporting and ohio's unemployment rates. let's compare those accomplishments to what mitt romney has to offer and what basis he is offering his economic plan. >> bill karins -- >> there's no basis, the math doesn't add up, and he's got nothing. so if you're going to say i've got nothing, you're crazy and you're absolutely wrong and you know it. mitt romney has got nothing. >> i think -- >> tell me what about his economic plan adds up? >> i think -- >> and actually means he's going to create 12 million jobs. he's going to balance -- are you kidding me?

>> i think there may be -- >> he's not -- he's making stuff up and blowing it out there with nothing. nothing. you know it. >> i think there may be a 74.6% chance i'm wrong. but then again, you know, the formula -- >> the model may shift. >> i may have a 50.1% chance of being correct. nobody can talk about what he's going to do in the future because you got no plan. he's intellectually exhausted. >> who are you talking about? mitt romney? >> both. still ahead, we're going to be talking to governor chris christie. man, he has choice words for atlantic city's mayor yesterday about his response to the storm but was nowhere near as rude as the atlantic city mayor as mika just was to me and that makes me sad. but i'm going to pick myself up off the floor and -- >> really? >> and get ready for the next segment because up next jimmy fallon and david letterman, the host of their respective shows

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welcome back to "morning joe." so last night, a couple of the late night shows went on here in new york city, but they went on without audiences. you can see in this video, jimmy

fallon upstairs at 30 rock, david letterman a few blocks away doing their shows, but no one to laugh, no one to clap, no one to cheer. here's dave last night without an audience. >> we felt like we would be putting the audience at jeopardy if they had to sit through the show. and i said, he will hell, we've been doing that for 30 years. i turned on the radio listening for the talk show closings, i had no luck. >> talk show closings. >> wait a minute, i hear people banging at the door of the theater demanding to come in. wait a minute, we don't want to miss this. the storm has stopped the presidential campaign so at least some good has come of it. all right. stop it. all right. that's fine. >> whoo! >> i'm that guy. >> okay. power outages could wreak havoc on election day, but don't

worry, republicans have backup crooked voting machines. wow. >> that may be the best letterman in years, i don't know. >> dave at his best. >> that was funny. >> he's a national treasure. >> he's amazing. >> without an audience last night. >> even better. >> so good. >> even better without an audience. when we come back, "hardbal "hardball' "hardball's" chris matthews.

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all right, welcome back to "morning joe." joining us from washington, the host of mmsnbc's "hardball," chris matthews, the author of "jack kennedy: elusive hero." good morning. we're going to get to politics in a moment. first, an update on the storm sandy, identified as a post tropical cyclone after a night that left people without power and created massive problems up and down the eastern seaboard. flood waters made it difficult for firefighters to reach a massive six-alarm fire that destroyed 50 homes overnight in the borough of queens.

with power out to nearly 700,000 people in and around new york city, much of the iconic manhattan skyline was pitch black with only the empire state building illuminating the sky. a crane partially collapsed at the start of the storm is still dangling from a high-rise. and at ground zero, sea water flooded through the construction site there as low-lying streets and neighborhoods along the hudson rivers were swamped. let's go to bill karins for the latest on the storm. >> good morning to you guys. and it's just starting to settle in. and once these pictures come in, it's going to be incredible. the kind of damage that sandy created. over my shoulder here, you're looking at one of the strongest storms to go through the mid-atlantic region and cause the most destruction of our lifetime. this has never happened for a storm like this in the jersey shore of this intensity. lowest pressure readings in philadelphia, atlantic city, new jersey. the highest measured in areas

like new york city. that is so rare and the effects were just beginning to realize. and wait until we find out how long it's going to take for the new york city subways to get running again. let's take you through the concerns this morning. 95% of the damage has been done. especially as we go throughout northern portions of the forecast area. that's up along the connecticut coast, possibly there around long island and then also maybe even a little bit in the new york city harbor. again, that's at 9:07 this morning is the next high tide cycle we need to watch. it will not be as bad as the one we got done with last night. also, 7 million people without power. as we head through november and the temperatures get cold this time of year. the 40s are in place over pittsburgh, philadelphia, all the way down to d.c. windchills in the 30s, especially down around the delmarva region. that's cold, chilly air to be in your house at night. a lot of people probably had a lot of warmth last night and now it is freezing, probably going

to have to find somewhere else to stay, not going to be an option especially if you have young kids in your house. not advised for anyone to be traveling in portions of west virginia or southern ohio. we have a full-fledged snowstorm. this is all the moisture from the hurricanes thrown back into the cold air and now a full-fledged blizzard going on in the appalachians, even cha charleston. so i guess you guys kind of see the big picture here. we're getting done with a very historic storm. i'm sure the name will be retired. this will go down as one of the worst storms ever to hit this region. and we'll see the sun up pictures and the jersey shore is the area of greatest concern. >> all right, bill karins, thank you. so many different stories in the aftermath as the storm slowly moves away. willie geist, you're looking between hospitals being evacuated and transformers blowing up. >> one of the most incredible things that was happening in new york city, new jersey, yesterday was the explosion of power

stations and transformers. if you were on the west side of new york city, i took this picture last night, walked down to riverside park along the west side of manhattan, you can see covering those benches, that's just one of -- i can't even count how many tens of transformer explosions in new jersey that would light up the sky. you can see that explosion in the sky and then you see an entire town go dark right along the river in new jersey. that's a power station explosion down in the east side of manhattan. but it was just incredible and continued all night from darkness until i went to bed at about midnight. it was one after another. some green, some red, some white. like a light switch, an entire block of power would go off until almost the whole coastline of new jersey along the hudson river was dark. >> it's going to be a long haul trying to recover from this. we're going to move to politics now. today is exactly one week to go until the presidential election.

and new polls this morning on how close the race is nationally. the gallup daily tracking poll has mitt romney up by five percentage points. the race even at 49% apiece, and a pew research center survey has the candidates 47% each. and it's still hard to get a sense as to who has the upper hand in those key swing states. in florida, a cnn/orc poll has mitt romney up by one point well within the margin of error. and in north carolina, where democrats held their convention last night, a poll has it 45% to 45%. >> chris, help us out here. you know, when you're in campaigns, you're always looking for trends. and you can usually can find trends. we haven't been able to find many. you've got national polls all over the place. you've got state polls all over the place. you've got bill clinton going into minnesota, you've got

barack obama and the republicans spending money in pennsylvania, and you have the republicans back on the defense in north carolina with a poll there. do you see any trends that we're missing? >> no, i think you're right. i think it's the drifting back and forth without any real purpose. the voters are back and forth on this. and people, of course, in the middle are back and forth. i think there's been one major event in this general election season, and that was the first debate which the president lost. and ever since then, it's almost been like newton's law of physics, it keeps in motion until operated by outside force. this weather condition situation, we don't know which way it's going to go, but it does, in fact, create a possible new force in this election. the president acting as president. so, look, the only thing he can do if he's smart is think about nothing else but being president for three days and hopes he'll get the breaks in terms of the election. >> mark haleprin, i would actually agree with that. there is this new force going on

right now. if you look at even some of the pictures coming in of the damage from this storm, the water damage, the electrical outages, everybody at this point up and down the east coast has been impacted in some way. this is a huge opportunity for president obama and mitt romney at this point he has no part in this equation. and any part he tries to take in this equation will look needy, desperate, and politically motivated. >> well, the white house is churning around the clock, making sure the president's doing the right thing substantively and politically. he wants to be back out there campaigning. governor romney, i think, is my sense is from the schedule they've been on so far, he's not going to try to be a national figure on this so much as he's going to go to the states that are battleground states and try to do events that combine talking about the storm with also campaigning in those battleground states. and i think by thursday, we'll

probably be back to where we were. >> chris, storm aside, in these final seven days, where are you as a guy who studied a lot of campaigns? where will you be looking? as obvious as looking at ohio? what do you have your eye on over the next week? >> i look at a lot of this. i don't know about pennsylvania, i've been watching it obviously all my life. and i think it has always been potentially in play. and a lot of conservatives in the southwestern part of the state, you have to see turnout in philly and the suburbs, but here's what i think. the one thing i've done in trying to pick the elections, totally objectively, thursday is the day i watch for. thursday, you can take the numbers on television, numbers we've just had there and look at which direction they're going in and pick the winner. generally the people begin to decide. in fact, they do begin to set a real direction by thursday. the one flaw in that this year is we do have a jobless number coming out friday, which may not be as big of a deal unless it goes back to eight. and then eight, i think, would go back to this weather situation as a detriment to the

president. the weather will dominate. i really disagree, i think, with mark, because if you go back to campaigning, like one of the two challengers, the way the president came across until this week, i don't think you have an advantage over romney. but as president, i remember at the charlotte convention you mentioned, the one great line obama had in an otherwise not great speech where he said i am the president now. i think he has to be president this week. it's really, really important he stay in the sit room where he's done some good work and serve this country for the next three or four days completely. that could change the direction of this campaign. going around waving at people and shaking hands, that's not going to work for him. >> hey, chris, you know, you said you can eventually most times in elections pick the winner on thursday when things begin to settle down. but this year seems to be different. this election cycle seems to be different. let's go to tuesday, the day when all the technology and all the polls and everything that,

you know, anyone like us says goes out the window and people actually vote. and then it becomes a turnout election. so give us your sense of a turnout election when the two variables are the president's people trying to get their vote out the way they did four years ago, women, minorities, suburban women, and maybe not be able to reach the number they reach four years ago. and governor romney's side clearly dependent on white male to come out and vote. give me your sense of the turnout election, the difficulties in both sides getting their side out. >> well, i think republicans are historically better voters, they tend to show with more frequency, more reliable. my parents were classics, voted all the time in every primary, went to church every sunday all the time. very regular, democrats are more driven by excitement and phenomenon. they have to be turned on to vote. and that's a problem. how many times can you be turned on to the same candidate?

so that's going to be a question. i think social media this time's playing a huge role. i hear constantly from everybody in the campaign, it never stops. i guess that's going to have an impact we've never seen before. just this relentlessness of social media. one thing i think with the storm may have an impact. if obama is seen objectively as hunkering down and not playing any games this week, really working, no mickey mouse, no big bird stuff. just do the damn job you were elected to this week. i think it'll take the poison and anger against him out of the race. and a little bit for this whole election, a little bit makes a bit of difference. and i think getting together and not being -- i think it's great that bloomberg said nice things about andrew cuomo, that's a new one, or christie said nice things about the president. they're operating like it's not intermurals anymore, it's the big game and that's always better for the country and the incumbent. >> off of what you just said,

governor christie's endorsement yesterday of the president as president doing his job as you just indicated was pretty powerful stuff. >> and i think it's because christie wants to be a good governor, he wants to be president some day and the way to be president is a be a good governor and it doesn't hurt to kiss the president. it all makes sense if you think about it. >> let's talk about the polls that have been all over the place. you've got gallup that shows plus five, plus six, plus seven in the national vote. and ohio polls have mainly benefitted the president. this past weekend you have ohio coming out, the newspaper polls showing ohio a dead heat. the same time, you've got a virginia poll coming out showing the president up by four. has it been harder for you as a guy who has followed politics for so long as it has been for me this year to trust the polls only because it seems like

they're trying to grapple with something that i'm sure there are going to be a lot of studies about six months from now. but seems like everybody's whistling past the graveyard, their methodology seems suspect, they can't figure out how many early voters to put into the mix, can't tell how many cell phone people -- it seems like an absolute mess. what's going on here? >> i know, i think it's wobbly. you just described the problem and the answer to the problem. the public's a bit adrift right now and trying to decide, obama has not been a failure as president, he's not been great, he's not been a failure. is he mediocre? a little better than mediocre? is he somewhere near great? people will disagree on that, but nobody's arguing the issue is in play. romney's been a very effective candidate lately, very effective, and he got rid of his opponents, smashed them to nothing. i think he's got a great team

around him. i think the president's team is too small, a little bit narrow and isolated to put it lightly. but i tell you, obama does have that amazing luck. and here's a guy that ran for the senate against two or three opponents who all dropped out because of marital problems. he walked into the united states senate, he was a celebrity before he got there. he ran against hillary and had the war issue against her, beat her on the war issue, took on john mccain when he was really beaten down by then. and here he is facing romney who is a very tough opponent. so this is going to be a close election. they're somewhat equally matched. like one of those swords and sandals movies, though, each guy has a different weapon. they don't have the same tool kit. but one thing obama has in his tool kit, i'll go back to, is hope. you don't run for president with the name of barack hussein obama without hope. i talked to him recently at the al smith dinner, i can't say what he said, but the guy has confidence, i'll tell you that. he has confidence. something tells him he wins.

i don't know what it is. it may be delusion narrary, but does have that confidence. he tells us to be hopeful, maybe this is the week he's got to have hope. like a pitcher in the seventh inning two runs back and has to put everybody out for the next three innings but has to hope the batters will come through and give him some bat. he has to hope, just like the pitcher in the seventh inning. get the other team out by doing his job and hoping to get some breaks. i don't think he can go out there and handshake his way and tell jokes to get reelected. i think he's got to get reelected on performance this week. >> chris, help us settle something we were talking about in our last hour. mika and joe were talking about what happens, you know, over the next four years, whether if the president is reelected or mitt romney is elected, as far as you can tell, what will the president do differently that he hasn't done over the last four years? and on the other side, do we have an idea of what mitt romney's administration will look like? >> well, let me answer the

second one, romney, if he wins, he gets 50 votes for the senate. he can do almost everything he wants to do or said he wants to through reconciliation. he can cut taxes, he can start health care, do a lot of things. just like reagan, can do it one big david stockman type grab and needs 50 votes and gets an automatic vote up or down. he can do a lot if he gets in there with a democratic loss of the senate and holding the house. if obama gets in there, i think he needs to look at a couple of people. i don't know what went wrong between him and boehner, but it better go right this time. i don't know who mcconnell who seemed to be the biggest enemy last time now realizes he can't beat the jim demint forces by being negative, he's got to get something done. he's not a right-winger. mcconnell's got to get in play and start being productive. it does take more than the president if he gets reelected. there has to be some good will and that's what i'm hoping coming out this week. a little sense we're all in this

together against something we didn't bring about and neither side this bad weather. that's my hope. >> all right. >> that's a new definition of hope. >> that's a good hope to have. to tell you the truth. >> as it compared to four years ago. it makes sense, though. >> i don't think we have any choice moving forward. and we shouldn't -- politicians shouldn't do what they've been doing over the past four years. like chris said, if the president gets reelected, he's got to deal with the republicans, republicans have to deal with him. >> but -- that -- isn't that the one inevitability if he's reelected? that they will have -- >> no, sadly it's not. we've been talking about that being inevitable for some time. i think they will. i think they're going to all learn from their mistakes and i think the ceos that are getting together and demanding that they be responsible are going to exert pressure on them. and let's cross our fingers and hope chris is right. >> okay. >> let's have a bumper sticker

for the next four years, do your job. >> do your job. >> get it done. >> chris, thank you so much. we're going to be watching "hardball" today at 5:00 and again at 7:00 p.m. >> thank you, chris matthews. good to see you. >> one final thought, mark. >> got a week to go. it's exciting. >> yeah. well, great. >> that's a great final thought. thank you. still ahead, new jersey governor chris christie is going to be with us. >> read the prompter. >> on what his state is facing in the aftermath of this storm. coming up next, nbc news political director chuck todd is going to be here. also eugene robinson, about the politics. ♪ ♪

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fema's about to run out of

money, and some people say do it on a case-by-case basis, and maybe we're learning a lesson, how do you deal with something like that? >> every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that's the right direction. and if you go even further and send it back into the private sector, that's even better. >> we're borrowing $1.6 trillion more this year than we're taking in. we cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids. it is simply immoral in my view. for us to rack up larger and larger debt knowing we'll be all dead and gone before it's paid off, makes no sense at all. >> all right. >> that was mitt romney. >> the reason you were so excited about mitt and if we can show you.

>> anyway, mitt romney who mika supports during the gop primary debate last year in june talking about fema now from washington, the associated editor of "washington post" gene robinson who takes on that response to mitt romney in his column. also with us, nbc news white house correspondent and political director and the host of the daily rundown, chuck todd. chuck, state of play of the campaign today. >> you know what i love? we're flying blind. got to suspend all of polling. we can't do any national polling, so you kind of like that. we're frozen in place, wednesday's campaign schedule. my guess is romney tries to do some things, i assume the president does not. and frankly we won't be full bore campaign mode, i think, until thursday.

>> what's the impact on the race? we're looking at polls right now. >> we're not going to be able to see any polls. like i said in a weird way, i'm kind of -- liberating, right? we might not know what the national polls say about this or that. but, look, i think that we have this converging going on before sandy hit, which was simply you saw that romney did have some momentum outside the battleground states. it was not evident that he was taking leads in places he needed to that it was basically grinded, turnout contest, which it is in the seven, six or seven final bat l ground states. i think romney was picking up a little bit of steam outside the battlegrounds that meant he would lose certain states by

single digits instead of double digits, low single digits instead of high single digits, things like that. >> gene, you wrote about mitt romney's debate discussion on fema. i'm going to guess you were probably against what mitt said. >> yeah, i thought it was a stupid thing to say, joe. frankly, i suspect if you were to bring governor romney on the program right now and ask him about what he said. all of the responsibilities to the states, i think he'd say, well, of course i didn't mean that and that's what he always says when confronted with something dumb he said in the past. but there is a larger point about the sort of shell game in my opinion the romney/ryan budget plays, which is just to say take the federal government's unfunded liabilities and send them down to the states and go like that

and say good luck and that's not a solution. and because people are going to expect the same services. it has to be a much more comprehensive solution to our budget woes. and i wish governor romney, frankly, i wish the campaign had dealt with that. but we are where we are. >> mike, what are the chances? >> yes, mike barnicle. >> when mitt romney's asked about fema relief. >> -- looks like he may jump out of his seat. >> i think when it comes to -- >> think he might change his position? >> when it comes to people running for president, this happened to barack obama, they change their minds once they assume office even in the interim when they're presented with things they didn't know otherwise. the president of the united states now, president obama when he was first presented with the full intelligence briefing in chicago. >> sure. >> said, you know, oh, and changed his mind about things. i think if president-elect romney, if he were to become

president would look at operations like fema, he would say -- >> hold on a second. mitt romney was governor himself. >> yes. >> he understands fema. so that makes what he said in the debate last year all the more nonsense. >> thank you. wow. i agree with you. >> fema, we need you. >> yeah. >> because he employed fema. >> used fema, worked well with fema. >> fema, dot, dot, dot, you betcha. >> anything we've learned over the past eight to ten years, we need to boost it, strengthen it. >> isn't that another case of primary speak there, though? >> yes, that's exactly what it is which is, you know, this is mitt romney, one of his problems, there's a sense that does he say what the room wants to hear? >> yeah. >> right, and that felt like a case where he was trying to look like, look, i'm not -- you may not believe i'm a conservative, remember the moment in the

campaign we were at at that time. by golly, you're going to believe i am a fiscal conservative like nobody's business, nobody's going to be able to outflank me on that. and that is one of those cases you said it that way. i just can't imagine any president that would somehow start cutting back on fema. when fema is a lifeline. i heard christie this morning, you're going to hear him again. i don't think he's going to be for cutting out of fema, and i don't know if chris christie is someone thought of as a fiscal liberal. >> no, not at all. what do you make of all of these polls, chuck, we've been talking about the polls all over the place. you've got, of course, minnesota, you've got bill clinton going to minnesota. that's a surprise. you've got karl rove and the president talking about spending money in pennsylvania. you've got suddenly the map

seems to be expanding a little bit on what president and romney supporters are doing. >> i think strategically, if i go back six months ago, it was a strategic mistake the romney campaign made by not trying to expand the map sooner. they're trying to rush in and do some things now, but if they could have thinned out the president's money for him to spend money in 12 states, they never did, never did this, i never understood that reasoning. they look at the polls and see, hey, if the national polls are at a point in one direction or the other, of course pennsylvania and minnesota is going to look close. but the question is, have you really done the leg work to win this state? you can -- you can -- momentum can make it close. you need the leg work in a state like pennsylvania or minnesota to actually get to 51. i believe those states have

closed, i believe that's all true. you can't look at a national poll and see a 50/50 race essentially moving one point or another and not have pennsylvania under five. not have minnesota under five. but, you know, i think i look back six months ago and wonder, you know, the romney -- the missed opportunity was then, not now. >> seeing all of these states seem to be tightening up. and it's not just in the president's direction where minnesota and pennsylvania are tightening up. you look down south, florida a new poll out has mitt romney only up by one. north carolina's a dead heat, a "washington post" poll heading down four, mitt romney down by four in virginia. it seems like every single state is thrown up in the air. a lot of consternation on both sides, and would you agree neither side has any idea who is going to win this race. >> yeah. i think we'll go into next tuesday blind, frankly. i don't think either side will

have confidence. both think that they'll win, but neither will have a lot of confidence in that, i think. >> i disagree, i think they're confident. >> well, but i think -- >> and maybe they're bluffing, but they really believe they're winning. >> i think there'll be real nervousness going into the evening and waiting for those exits. >> there should be. >> and i wonder how much is bravado and bluster. i've talked to both sides, they both say convincingly that they're going to win. so, you know. >> well -- >> joe, chicago fundamentally believes the demographics are going to keep -- demographics and this organizational advantage they have in ohio and iowa are just making it impossible for romney to get to 270. they believe this in their bones, and i have, you know, you look for any sign of anything of a bluffing. are they blinking to you in

morse code while they're telling you something else? none of that in chicago. and what boston really believes is that boston believes when you look at the fundamentals, in any other position, any challenger with this kind of movement that's happened over the last two weeks, those challengers rarely lose. that's why they think they're going to win. >> chuck, you think that chicago believes they have a 73.6% chance of winning? >> i'm not getting into this. i'm not getting into this. >> do you think they believe they have a 73.6% chance -- >> they believe they have -- but they certainly believe they have a much higher percentage than 50/50. i think they have about somewhere between 60 and 70. >> 72.9%. >> 63.4%. >> the model changes. >> we'll see you at 9:00 a.m. on the "daily rundown." eugene, thank you, as well, your column online at washingtonpost.com. new jersey's facing a long

road back from yesterday's deadly storm. we'll bring in governor chris christie to talk about the recovery efforts there. plus, his take on the presidential election now just one week away. we'll be right back. meet the 5-passenger ford c-max hybrid. when you're carrying a lot of weight, c-max has a nice little trait, you see, c-max helps you load your freight, with its foot-activated lift gate. but that's not all you'll see, cause c-max also beats prius v, with better mpg. say hi to the all-new 47 combined mpg c-max hybrid.

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welcome back to "morning

joe," point pleasant beach where the dunes got washed away and the water washed well into the town up and down the new jersey coast. i'm sure there's that ton of water damage in each and every one of the structures you're looking at right there. we'll be giving you reports throughout the day up and down the new jersey coastline as we look at daybreak and how bad the devastation and destruction is. we know a lot of the beautiful boardwalks there are gone in most cases. the concerns i still have with this storm. we're almost done with the damage phase. i'd say 95%. we still have to go through the morning high tide cycle, still minor problems in and around the greater new york city area, long island, connecticut, and rhode island. but it won't be as bad as what we saw last night. there'll be a little bit of minor additional damage and again, that's early. hour and a half from now to 2 1/2 hours from now. the other thing that's causing a lot of headaches today i'm sure schools are being canceled in most of west virginia for the kids, in ohio, you're getting a lot of snow right now from

columbus southward, even more than you were expecting probably, and we've got blizzard conditions on top of that, the winds are howling around this storm. so i saw one report that we have seven states right now that it's snowing in because of this hurricane. how crazy does that sound? other people without power, it's cold, your house was probably pretty warm when you went to bed, the windchill is 34 right now in washington, d.c., all through the delaware area, maryland, much of new jersey as the windchill is in the 40s too, and we have 2 million people without power in new jersey right now. that's a big concern, these people thought they could be in their houses during this power outage, it may be too cold for you, especially for the elderly and the children. if you have power out there, invite as many people into your house as you possibly can. be a good neighbor and a good friend. when we come up, speaking of new jersey, one of the hardest hit state, we're going to get firsthand account of what the latest is from governor chris

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shell is producing ethanol - a biofuel made from renewable sugarcane. >>a minute, mom! let's broaden the world's energy mix. let's go. live look at point pleasant beach, new jersey. oh, boy. this morning is going to reveal a lot of damage from the hurricane. joining us now from new jersey, the republican governor chris christie. good to have you onboard this morning. give us the latest about what's happening to your state. >> mika, listen, it's a major disaster, it's devastating. we'll start with jersey shore where you started. the devastation at the jersey shore is probably going to be the worst we've ever seen. i'm looking forward to this

afternoon getting up in a helicopter. we can't get up this morning because the winds are still 30 to 50 miles an hour, we'll get up this afternoon and tour the coastline. i've got a feeling that the damage there is going to be incalculable. the other problems we have this morning. we have enormous tidal surge up the coast and into newark bay, which is also affecting new york city. and that caused flooding in places, we're doing urban search and rescue last night. we have five substations out by newark bay, which has lost all the power to the city of newark and a good amount of power to the city of jersey city. we had a berm that was overwhelmed last night, which is leading us to rescue hundreds of people this morning. we've got a significant problem on our hands. 2.4 million households without power. so we have a lot of work to do. >> hey, governor, can you give us an update, a logistical

update on new jersey turnpike, bridges, tunnels, openings, people's ability to begin to get travel perhaps today? >> yeah. first, mike, let me just say, i don't want people traveling to new jersey today unless it's absolutely necessary. there are over 200 roads closed. we just reopened the garden state parkway. the garden state parkway had been closed from exit 129 all the way to cape may. we have now reopened the entirety of the garden state parkway. that is now opened and ready for people to travel on it. we still have the new jersey turnpike closed between exits 11 and 14. i mean, this is how bad the tidal surge was last night, mike, to give you an example. we had rail cars, empty freight rail cars wash up on the new jersey turnpike. and today we're getting cranes to take those rail cars off the new jersey turnpike. they have washed up firm rail yards adjacent to the turnpike

and the tidal surge was so heavy and so strong it moved freight rail cars. >> that sums it up. >> i'll say first as a new jersey native and someone with a lot of friends and family in the state, they're grateful you're in the governor's mansion as we go through this crisis right now. i want to ask you about atlantic city, which was just slammed. i know there were some people stranded out there, a lot of people stranded out there who stayed in their homes. what's the state of that? i know you said last night we can't get to you till the sun comes up. are you able to get some of those people out of atlantic city? >> sure, we have three urban search and rescue teams with over 50 men and women who are in atlantic city right now rescuing people. we have urban search and rescue teams, as well. so, yeah, atlantic city, we are rescuing those folks now, we started that operation at about 5:30 this morning. down in atlantic city and it's ongoing as we speak. and we've been able to rescue

some folks out of there. so far, the loss of life has been minimal, thank god, but we have lost three folks, two in my hometown, actually, a parent who tree hit their pickup truck. they had their 11 and 14-year-old children in the car, they survived, but both parents were killed. >> governor, where was that? >> that's in my hometown of mendom, new jersey. >> do you have a sense of how many people are stranded in atlantic city, that is a big town. >> we don't have a sense yet of the number of people stranded in atlantic city. we're working on that now. with officials from the boardwalk district down there and our state police. we are in the midst of rescuing folks, and i've gotten positive information about that. we are rescuing folks and getting them out of atlantic city and that's good news. so we'll see what happens in the rest of the day. the high tide has just happened

again, hopefully now we'll see waters receding and we'll be able to move other types of vehicles into atlantic city and other places up and down the new jersey coast. >> governor, mark haleprin here, if people around the country want to help people from your state, what can they do? >> well, listen, we have the american red cross this year and the salvation army, they've been helpful. we have thousands of people sheltered right now across new jersey and the red cross has been great and so has the salvation army. if they want to make donations, that would be helpful. if there are people in this area, we have a volunteer line, it's 1-800-jersey-7. if you want to help friends and neighbors, you can call that number and we will put you to work. so we need a lot of help here. but mark, you know this, you've been here, this is a tough place with a whole lot of tough people. so once we'd be able to assess the damage this morning, we're going to get to work and we'll be fine. >> all right.

mike, go ahead. >> governor, there is no ideology in a storm like this. tell us about your conversations with the president yesterday. >> the president's been great, mike, i have to tell you, and i'm sorry, joe, i was calling you mike, it was hard to hear through here. you know, the president's been great. i spoke to him three times yesterday, he called me for the last time at midnight last night asked me what i needed and i said if you could expedite the major disaster exploration without the major fema mumbo jumbo. i got a call from fema at 2:00 a.m. for me to answer a couple of questions. the president has been all over this and deserves great credit. i've been on the phone with him, like i said personally three times, he gave me his number at the white house, told me to call him if i needed anything and he absolutely means it. >> that's great. >> it's been very good. it's been very good working with the president, and his administration has been coordinating with us great, it's been wonderful. >> you have all the first responders, you need enough people on the ground.

>> yeah, i think we do. i think we do, joe. we've got a number of folks, not only governor daniels from indiana yesterday sent us 25 ambulances fully staffed. to help us. they drove all day and got here in order to help us move patients from hospitals that needed to be evacuated in a safe manner. so the cooperation around the country has been great. governor walker has offered up resources that we've been able to use. i should mention governor daniels. so folks have been really, really good around this country. so we have at least at the moment the resources i need. we're clearing roads, but it's going to be getting power back. you have 2.4 million households in new jersey without power. compare that, that's 1 million more than we had in irene. >> wow. >> so it is -- it is a completely devastating storm from that perspective. and i think what we're going to find, unfortunately, when we get

to the jersey shore today is just total devastation. >> yeah. >> and that's the real concern. because not only is it people's homes and private property, but also you have the tourism industry in new jersey which is one of our biggest industries. we're going to have to work hard to make sure we're ready for next summer at the jersey shore. >> governor chris christie, our prayers are with the state of new jersey this morning. thank you very much. >> thank you, governor, good luck. >> mika, joe, mike, willie, thank you all you guys, appreciate it. coming up in minutes, author of the best-selling book "the perfect storm" and "war," we'll be right back. ♪ ♪ [ multiple sounds making melodic tune ]

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up next, as people wake up on the east coast, we assess the damage from the storm. we'll be back with the latest straight ahead on "morning joe." ♪

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good morning it's 8:00 a.m. on the east coast, 5:00 a.m. on the west coast as you take a live look at new york city. we have mike barnicle and mark haleprin. we'll begin, of course, with the wrap-up of the night and hurricane sandy as a post tropical cyclone pushing inland after a night of destruction that hasn't even begun to be assessed. the storm left 7.1 million people without power. sandy slammed into the new jersey shore last night with winds of 80 miles per hour. and more in some places bringing with it an overwhelming surge. "the associated press" reports at least 16 u.s. deaths are now being blamed on sandy across seven states. the combination of flood waters

and a loss of electricity created an urgent situation for a new york city hospital. the staff at nyu langone medical center was forced to evacuate hundreds of patients overnight including infants from the neo natal intensive care unit after backup power failed. they are still evacuating patients as we speak. we'll get to more on that in a moment, but first, let's go straight to meteorologist bill karins for the very latest. bill? >> good morning to you guys. and it's just starting to settle in. and once these pictures come in, it's just going to be incredible. the kind of damage that sandy created. over my shoulder here, you're looking at one of the strongest storms to go through the mid-atlantic region and caused the most destruction of our lifetime. this has never happened for a storm like this in the jersey shore of this intensity. lowest pressure readings ever in philadelphia and atlantic city, new jersey, and the storm surge, the highest ever measured in areas like new york city. that is so rare. and the effects we're just beginning to realize.

and wait until we find out how long it's going to take for the new york subway to get running again. let's take you through the concerns this morning. 95% of the damage has been done. we still have a little bit more damage to be done at this early high tide cycle, especially as we go throughout northern portions of the forecast area, that's up along the connecticut coast. possibly around long island and the new york city harbor. that's at 9:07 this morning. also, we now have 7 million also we have 7 million people without power. as we head toward november and the temperatures get cold this time of year, the 40s are in place over pittsburgh, philadelphia, down to d.c. windchills in the 30s, especially down around the delmarva region. that's cold, chilly air to be in your house at night. a lot of people probably had a lot of warmth last night and now it is freezing. they're going to have to find somewhere else to stay, not going to be an option, especially if you have young kids to stay in your house if you don't have heat.

the other item during the day, not advised anyone to be traveling in the areas of west virginia or portions of southern ohio. we have a full-fledged snowstorm. this is all the moisture from the hurricane thrown back into the cold air. now we've got a full-fledged blizzard going on in the appalachians through charleston and even a lot more snow than we were expecting in southern ohio and trying to sneak into kentucky. i guess you guys kind of see the big picture here, we're getting done with a very historic storm, i'm sure the name will be retired. one of the worst storms ever to hit this region. and we'll see the sun-up pictures and the jersey shore is the area of greatest concern. >> so came along the jersey shore, storm surges going into new york harbor and causing the damage that was caused in the southern part of manhattan. what about up the connecticut coastline? what do the storm surges look like? not only in long island sound on the connecticut side but obviously on the long island side. >> yes, the long island side looks like it was bad.

and especially talking about houses going into the ocean at fire island. other areas we haven't heard too much about the hamptons, not too many reports out of there. the high tide cycle was later, the high tide cycle in connecticut was closer to midnight. both reports have been slower to come in, less people along the coast, they evacuated. not like new york city where everyone was right there to witness it. we had a high tide about 9 feet above average in the new haven area, fairfield area, right along the coast in greenwich, we had a rush of water, homes that burned, million dollar homes right down along the coast there that caught fire, firefighters couldn't get to rescue them. so those areas also got devastated too. but i think if we're going to have the one lasting memory of this storm, you're looking at it right here, last night, breezy point, queens, right near jfk airport. winds were gusting to 50 miles per hour, this was in an evacuation zone. but i know for a fact following twitter last night, there were people in these houses when these fires were starting panicking, trying to figure out where to go, what to do. it's a very small sliver of

island and there wasn't a lot of room for people to escape. i'm very afraid if people got caught in these flames last night. again, 50 homes that burned. the firefighters got there, did not have water pressure. they had to try to pump water out of the oceans using their engines, it was a nightmare scenario for these firefighters in 50-mile-per-hour winds. that's going to be the legacy and then we'll see what the helicopters show us this morning and this afternoon when they fly along the jersey shore. i don't think there's many communities that went unscathed. many of them are reporting extreme damage on their boardwalk. the mayor was on this morning saying he can't believe it and they're going to have to probably rebuild most of this. >> and it's hard to imagine the fire, the massive fire in the rock aways. firefighters were rushed out there early this morning, more than 50 homes destroyed, it was a six-alarm fire around 3:30 a.m., and it still has not been contained. >> and i was reading reports

overnight, the governor of new jersey very upset because certain people didn't evacuate. for people who did not and are holed up, it could be a long haul for them. >> i didn't even mention atlantic city. atlantic city had the high tide yesterday morning that shocked us. in the morning high tide cycle the pier broke apart and water rushed into the streets and then they had the higher one on top of it last night that we haven't seen the pictures of. think about the economy down there. those casinos have been struggling anyways, they built a brand new big one and now this? the economy down there is going to be devastated probably for months if not a couple of years to come. >> all right. >> and willie, of course, the worst disaster in subway history. unbelievable. the mta -- look at that picture. on tuesday the storm was the worst disaster in new york city subway system history. and who knows how long it's going to be until the subways are reopen in new york.

>> you know, one of the things -- and we realize, you know, this is one sliver of this great country of ours, but one of the things in seeing these pictures and seeing the pictures from the langone medical center in manhattan, nurses carrying out infants from the pediatric unit. >> battery operated ventilators. >> firefighters out in the rock aways, when we go to cover as we will politics and the presidential election, it should be framed up with the thought in mind that there are millions of people in this country who never not for a single day shrink from their responsibilities. the nurses, the police officers, the firefighters, the first responders. the people who hold things together in the midst of chaos, the chaos we saw yesterday. >> and they were working on getting the patients out all night. it took about six hours to get 70 patients out. one-by-one gliding them down on basic kind of sleds almost down

flights and flights of stairs while trying to keep them alive. they're still doing it at this hour. >> as you said with hand ventilators. >> with hand ventilators and other apparatus. >> jack was in the nicu for about six months. and the thought that you would have to unhook these tiny babies who are struggling for life who every moment parents are sitting there hoping that they continue breathing and then in the middle of the storm to remove them from what has been effect their life support and walk them down ten flights of stairs and try to keep them alive while you go to another nicu. >> the process was calm and methodical, but absolutely nobody was losing their cool. bill, you were also showing images that popped up on the screen there. one of them was ground zero and water rushing in. i mean, just completely

submerging practically lower manhattan. the impact and the damage that water can cause, we have yet to even understand what will happen. not only in new york city where we are right now, there's the image i'm talking about, but up and down the coastline. >> i was actually there when that happened. i was down in battery park when the high tide was coming in, and i was trying to rush back to the studios and beat it before i got trapped and we were going right by there. drove by there, about 2 feet of water. and it was just surreal how the water was flowing through. people don't realize, lower manhattan doesn't have much elevation. it's very flat and that's what battery parked looked like. as soon as it went over the edge, it filled up in a hurry. joe was mentioning the subways. in the middle of the night, we had an interview with a guy from the mta, they have six tunnels right now that are flooded with all the water that surged. the way they get that water out, pumped it out. that could take up to four days possibly. if you're talking about a

four-day disruption for millions of people not to be able to work, not to be able to move on with their lives. a lot of people take subways to school in different boroughs in new york city. this is going to last well to election day. i'm just talking about new york city. who knows how long it's going to be for power to be restored in areas of connecticut and new jersey to have a lot of trees. >> all right, bill, we'll be back with you. thank you so much. i know you've been working through the night since the last time we saw you yesterday. >> great job, bill. >> bill karins. >> to mike's point about the firefighters too. if you were watching live television last night at 11:30 at night or so, you can see live on television, as you said, mika. nurses bring these babies out cradling them, running through the rain, getting into ambulances, ambulances that had lined up down first avenue from other hospitals so they could come rescue. you would see firefighters running in to a building in chelsea whose facade at come off completely leaving it look like a doll house. the front of a building comes off, firefighters within five seconds turn and run into the building.

we have incredible people serving us and we're very lucky in new york city. >> aren't they unbelievable? >> okay. it's 12 past the hour. we're going to make a turn to politics and quite frankly how the weather and politics collide in this case. we've got one week to go until the presidential election if you can believe it in the middle of all of this. new polls this morning on how close the race is. the tracking poll is likely voters has romney up by 5 percentage points. a new washington post abc tracking poll of likely voters has the race even at 49% apiece, a pew research center survey has the candidates not among likely voters, 47% each, can you believe this? and it's still hard to get a sense as to who has the upper hand in key swing states. in florida, a cnn/orc poll has

romney up by just one point well within the margin of error. and in north carolina, where democrats held their convention last month, a university poll has it even 45% to 45%. >> mark haleprin, can't get much closer everywhere. >> i mean -- >> and minnesota, minnesota is not even a key swing state. you've got bill clinton going in because a new poll shows mitt romney within the margin of error in minnesota. plus, you have some information about some space where the republicans are about to start rushing in and putting up campaign ads that are not states that the obama team thought they would have to worry about one week out. >> we're going to go into election day not knowing. i don't care how rabid a partisan you are, we're going to

go into election day not knowing who is going to win this. the race is simply too close, too many variables and the storm has a lot of new ones. we just can focus on what we see. one thing we see is democrats are playing a little bit more definition than they thought they would. and if you bring those states in to the electoral college picture, minnesota, pennsylvania, maybe michigan, where republican allies of mitt romney are now going on the offensive, it changes the electoral college outlook quite a bit. not saying governor romney's going to win any of those. they say we're not going to lose these states, it's all silly. i think if governor romney's allies went on television in california, they wouldn't be inclined to play defense there. they feel a little bit of vulnerability in those states. and again, if you take the non-battlegrounds, expand the map a little bit to include pennsylvania, minnesota, and maybe michigan, it's a much different calculation. >> karl rove is going to be putting up ads in pennsylvania now, the president is putting up ads in pennsylvania now.

>> yep. >> suddenly the keystone state is the final week out up for grabs. why? not up for grabs yet, the polls show it close. but both sides realize that it's not safe anymore. >> what's the big deal to last week, we have enough money to go there. it's not the money on television, that's not nothing, it's the candidate's time, joe biden going to scranton. i suspect if things keep on the current trajectory, the president might have to go to pennsylvania, bill clinton might have to be there repeatedly. every day they're spending in pennsylvania is a day they're not spending in ohio. the republicans believe, not just rove's group, but some of the others, they believe there's a possibility to at a minimum keep the president on the -- having to not just focus on ohio. and if they can distract him away from ohio to play defense in these other places, they can increase their chances.

the democrats totally dismiss this, but there's a reality. they're playing defense. >> you can say dismissive, but mike barnicle, the fact that democrats would put their key asset, bill clinton -- >> in pennsylvania. >> in minnesota today, two stops in minnesota today, that's -- that's worrisome for the democrats. >> yeah. if you -- if you're taking one of your principal assets, the president and the vice president frozen now, the key asset not only your principal asset, your key asset, but one really big asset and you're moving him to a state otherwise thought to be in your pocket a week or ten days ago, you don't have to be a genius and certainly i'm no genius to realize they are looking at internals that are causing them some concern. imagine a world where mitt romney is president and he might be able to accomplish. also, we'll talk to delaware governor jack markell about the

storm's impact on his state. and best-selling author, you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks.

18 past the hour. david brooks, david, good to have you onboard with us this morning. >> good to be with you. >> i'm going to read a part of your piece, "the upside of opportunism." let's try to imagine the world of mitt romney were to win. faced with a democratic senate, he would also observe the core lesson of this campaign,

conservatism loses, mod race wins. to get reelected in a country with a rising minority population and shrinking republican coalition, it would reduce him to govern as a center right moderate. the republicans in congress would probably go along. they wouldn't want to destroy a republican president. romney would champion enough reforms to allow some republicans to justify their vote. the bottom line is this, if obama wins, we'll probably get -- romney wins, we're likely to get republican reform. romney is more of a flexible flip-flopper than obama. he has more influence over the most intransigent element in the washington equation of house republicans. he's more likely to get big stuff done. >> so, david, this appears to be a time when flip-flopping could pay off. >> it could. you know, one of the things that's bugged me about this

whole election is the candidate -- they've got big plans, we're living in a polarized, divided country, how are you going to get anything done? and we came close two years ago, i'm not totally persuaded if they tried that again, which is really what i think obama envisions they'd do any better than they did last time. i think we'd probably kick the can down the road. with romney, he does what the market demands. and the market is not demanding a tea party president. so i think he'd shift over toward the middle where i personally think that's where his soul is, so to be honest, i'm guessing about that. >> we're all guessing about that. what is so interesting to us certainly to me is that he didn't go to the center like nixon always says you go to the center in a general election when most candidates do. at the convention, he waited till that first debate and certainly in the third debate he completely blew apart this perception of mitt romney as

hard right neo conservative. >> and you know, if you think he's an opportunist, and i'm not sure he totally is, but if you think he is, he's going to do what the incentives tell him to do. and i think in a country as i wrote with the shrinking republican base where the tea party may have already cost the republicans two senate seats, may cost them two more this election in indiana and missouri. the incentives are all toward him being a little more moderate, trying to get something done. >> all right. we're obviously covering two big stories here, the presidential election a week away and this massive storm. any connection that you make between the two in terms of impact on the election? >> yeah, storms always have a political impact. there's looking for somebody to blame. we saw that with katrina. one other thing the storm does exposes our illusion of self-control. the idea you are really running your life, you're in control of everything. in new york city, your hometown, you barely think of nature at all as pointed out in a good

blog post this morning. you think oh, i'm running my life. then this massive thing comes in and just sweeps you away. and it reminds you you're not in control of your life. it's going to be a storm one day, a foreign crisis another, it's going to be a bad diagnosis from another, you are not in control of your life. there are things much bigger than you. so what this does is reminds us that we need a little security and order. we also need a rainy day fund. you know, when we running up huge deficit. if something like this hits a bigger problem, do we have the money to spend given how indebted we are? but i think the lesson for politics is people generally vote for the candidate who is more orderly, who is offering them security. they got enough risk in their lives. barack obama was more orderly than john mccain. george w. bush was more orderly than john kerry. and so if i'm a candidate this year, i'm trying to reassure people i'm the guy who can help you out when forces much bigger than you come in and give you a big wallop. >> you said a minute ago, you're

not quite sure where mitt romney's soul is, and i think a lot of people, republicans included would agree with you about that. is he socially conservative? is he the massachusetts moderate? is he a small-government conservative? does that trouble you about what kind of president he would be? in other words, if we don't know who he is now, should we worry about who he would be if he got into office? >> yeah. it does trouble me. it disturbs me about how many different shapes he's taken. from a sheer management perspective. if you work in the reagan administration, if you started meeting at the deputy's level, you know what the president wants already, so you figure out how to enact what he basically wants. if you work for a president who doesn't know what he wants, then every policy decision has to start at square one and there's massive confusion. a lack of a consistency can really mess up a management structure. the area where it doesn't bother me is this, we're no longer in the cold war. we had a cold war leadership model which was the forthright

person who never bends, just strong, sort of the margaret thatcher, cold war leadership. we're no longer in a cold war. maybe a little less conviction politician, a little more flexible to deal with. we have three big problems, we've got growth, we've got debt and inequality. it takes a bit of subtlety to deal with these three cross-cutting issues and a little more pragmatism if you want to put it that way would be useful. nonetheless, opportunism, a little troubling. >> david, help me out here. i've always considered a certain aspect of your work to label you as the david reeseman of american journalism. and so yesterday and today ongoing process from washington, d.c. on up through new york city and new england, we have this storm, and the lincolns you just referenced to our politics.

and we've seen people who do their jobs, who have seen firefighters, nurses, police officers doing their job. and yet voters next week on tuesday will go to the voting booth and they will be voting on people, you know, who don't do their job, speaking specifically of members of the house and the senate. and they punish people on the ballot. president, people running for president who they perceive as not being up to the job, not doing their job. why does this dichotomy exist, do you think, in people on the line, presidents, governors, and mayors are often rejected, and yet the congress where they do very little, continue 93% of them. >> i keep a list of people in washington i really admire to remind myself when i'm stuck here, there are at least these good people, and there are people who have been through this, the key thing is when they do their job, it's not about them, it's about the job. they've temporarily inhabited a job and they're going to fulfill

the duties of that job and that's what cops and firemen do. they're not going to get on tv, but there's a specific craft and they do their job. and that's, i think, what we admire. a lot of people in washington, it's not about the job, it's about them. second, local government officials, it's concrete. you're dealing with something, you can see the precinct, you can see the house, the street with a hole in it. in washington it's abstract. pretty often you're taking positions, ideological positions that really more about philosophy, personal identity, more about status. and therefore people get wrapped up in extraction. when i watched, it was interesting to watch rahm emanuel go become mayor of chicago, suddenly dealing with a school district, much happier dealing with concrete problems. >> david, you talked about how a republican congress wouldn't want to destroy -- wound a presidency of mitt romney. some people in the commentary

very surprised he's done nothing to stand up to his party in a dramatic way. what specifically do you think he might ask of republicans in congress that they would reluctantly go along with in dealing with the fiscal cliff? >> well, you know, there are going to be democrats probably controlling the senate. and there's got to be revenues. probably increase revenues, and you do a big tax reform, fold in increased revenues on the affluent in that to make democrats happy and that'll make a lot of republicans unhappy. and i'd say the way to tell he's had a successful presidency is if he gets a primary challenge on the right in 2016. i know primary challenges are bad predictions for incumbents, nonetheless, that's a sign he's broken out of stagnation and done something original. >> but you are exactly right, though, you bring up a good point. a lot of democrats have been saying over the past several years, john boehner can't deal with members of the tea party. you know, i've been there. and i always said it's one thing

to stand up to your speaker, it's another thing to stand up to your republican majority leader. it's quite another to stand up to the president of the united states. anybody out there thinking that members, conservative members aren't going to be more compelled to go along with the president romney than a speaker boehner, i don't think, david, they understand the dynamics of washington. everybody in the party seems to be forced to rally behind the president of their party, right? >> the power of partisanship is really strong for us. i do think when he would say are you going to destroy my presidency in the first six months, enough of them would say no, i'm going to be with you. and i look on the other hand if president obama's reelected how much leverage is he going to have? he's going to have some, there'll be no question about it because he's been reelected, but he didn't exactly run on the fiscal cliff, on the actual challenges we're going to face, i'm not sure the mandate's going to be strong. and the other incentives for the members is going to be the same. i speak to very conservative members. they're more afraid of being primaried from the right than

they are challenged from the left. that's the primary concern. so it's an easy call for them. >> that is an easy call. one of the other things just to say the way this works. you get primaries from the right when you have a party that's out of power. you didn't see a lot of primaries from the right when george w. bush was president because you have the president, the rnc, the whole apparatus standing behind the incumbent who would probably be primaried because they went along with the president. fascinating dynamic. >> thank you very much. >> thank you, david. >> pleasure having you on the show. >> thank you. pleasure, and thanks for the coverage. >> coming up, sebastian junger joins us in the studio. more "morning joe" in just a moment. honey, they have the 55 inch lg...

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a whole bunch of the new jersey coastline under water this morning. jersey took a brunt of this thing. sandy made landfall around 8:00 last night. just north of atlantic city in point pleasant beach. flood waters washed away much of the beach front. the weather channel's mike seidel is right there for us now. mike? >> reporter: the sun is up here on the jersey shore and here at

point pleasant beach, you can really see how sandy decimated the beaches and brought the beach inland. this is ocean avenue, and it was an ocean last night, the water ripping through here at about 4 to 5 feet deep going well inland, this morning, as far as the eye can see, they're going to have to bring in front loaders and bulldozers. and right here, a sink hole that's developed with a big puddle of water. this hotel says they've never had water go in the front door, well, never has come to an end. and once you go inland about a block, you pick up the sea water that didn't go back into the atlantic. that's sitting there for five or six blocks. look at this parking meter. this will give you a great visual of how deep this sand is out here on ocean avenue. these buildings right here first floors, forget about it. all the beach front property not on high stilts, the first floor is a total loss because of the surge. the surge took out the boards. meanwhile, there's the atlantic out there. look at the damage, that's where we were standing yesterday, that whole area, the decking, it's been ripped by the power of the

water. again, second floors are in good shape. and inland, we didn't see any houses that crumbled into the atlantic and houses inland are fine, and looking at the power grid, the poles and wires here are up. again, we don't have a lot of trees. this will be a long and arduous clean-up as sandy rolls inland. we have gusts today, 40 maybe 50 miles an hour and a few showers. i'm mike seidel with the weather channel reporting from point pleasant, new jersey. back to you. >> all right. from new jersey to delaware now. joining us now from wilmington, democratic governor of delaware jack markell. jack, good to have you on the show. give us the latest on how delaware faired. >> well, it was a significant storm. a lot of roads have flooded and the like. i have to say, even though we were expected to be right in the path, the worst has spared us, looks like, and we've ratcheted

back some of the driving restrictions we had in place. >> yeah, we have new jersey, especially, everything has gone wrong, obviously from water damage to a lot of road closures, which is getting to people is difficult. is delaware at this point -- what are you getting from your storm center in terms of how people are in terms of being stranded, evacuations, did they heed the warnings? what are you most worried about right now? >> i'd say i'm most worried about the power outages. but people did heed our warnings. we had an evacuation period from saturday night to sunday night. we had driving restrictions on. i think we were fortunate for that. but we're also fortunate that it looked like we were spared the worst of it. our hearts go out to those in other states. obviously the families of those who have died. and we still do have a lot of people here without power. it could have been a lot worse.

>> governor, obviously you've had recent problems getting power back on. what's the prognosis for that this time? >> well, this is a complicated storm with the significant wind. it could take a little bit longer than normal. that being said, the -- our utilities are very much on it. they have a lot of extra people on hand. they have lots of trucks ready to go. they're going to be out today doing assessments. i think we'll know later today or tomorrow just how long it'll take. we had warned people we thought it could be a week or more, we'll have to see if that holds true. obviously it's important as the winds die down, it's going to be a lot easier for them to get out and put people back on. >> all right. governor jack markell, thanks for checking in, best of luck to you. we'll have you back to talk politics soon. >> thank you. >> thank you so much, governor. >> up next, sebastian junger joins the table. much more "morning joe." tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 let's talk about low-cost investing.

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tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 with schwab mobile deposit. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 investors should consider tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 carefully information tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 contained in the prospectus, tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 including investment objectives, tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 risks, charges, and expenses. you can obtain tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 a prospectus by visiting tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 www.schwab.com/schwabetfs. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 please read the prospectus tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 carefully before investing. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 the powerful atlantic storm battered the eastern sea board for the second day in a row. it caused heavy damage to president bush's vacation home in maine. the storm also hit hard along florida's coast destroying at least one more. >> that was tom brokaw reporting back in 1991 on the so-called perfect storm. hurricane sandy was by some being compared to that rare weather event. and joining us now contributing editor of "vanity fair" and

author of the book "the perfect storm" sebastian junger. good to have you back. >> thank you. >> and we've been following you talking about the war, but we can talk about the storm. >> well, an anniversary really. >> yeah, that's what tom was just talking about. 21 years ago last week, the perfect storm last week. do you see a parallel? there seems to be a parallel people are drawing in terms of meteorology. >> yeah, just about to the day, 21 years ago. there are are parallels, also differences. you had that late-season hurricane in '91 and yesterday you had a late-season hurricane mixed with a low pressure system coming out of the midwest and a really strong high. and the pressure and the temperature differential between the high in the hurricane and the low creates incredibly strong winds. in this case, the hurricane went onshore and caused the damage. in the storm i wrote about, the hurricane went offshore but it

reenforced the low, and it was the low that actually just punched new england between the eyes and caused huge amount of damage. >> how did you get, grab on to that story the way you did? the perfect storm? how did you first hear about it and pursue it so doggedly? >> i was living in the town of gloucester when it hit. and i was working as a high climber for tree companies and i hit my leg with a chain saw and as i was limping around, i was thinking about, i've got to move on to really making writing work and maybe i'll write a book about dangerous jobs and this storm rolled in to gloucester and just started smashing all the water front houses and the next morning i found out a gloucester boat had gone down in 70-foot seas offshore, and i was like that's a dangerous job, i want to find out about it. >> now, the -- you just referenced "the perfect storm" in 1991 and what's happened the past few days along the east coast, specifically the great damage done in new jersey and new york and we were talking about september 11th off camera.

and it's always interested me and clearly i think culturally people who do these dangerous jobs. people who do their jobs first responders, firefighters, police officers, nurses last night at the langone medical center taking babies out of the medical center late at night. they hide from us the rest of the time when there's nothing in evidence like there has been right now. the pictures we see, it's an interesting cultural deal going on among us. >> yeah, these are hardworking people that have day-to-day jobs and sometimes aren't particularly dramatic. but when society needs them, god forbid we don't have them. i mean the army's a little bit like that. right through the '80s, it was a peacetime army, and then through the '90s pretty much, all of a sudden we needed an army. and society needs people to do those jobs. and they're incredible.

and i think -- i know from soldiers the thing that gets the thing that gets them not to be fearful is they have a job to do. and i think that helps firemen, cops. you have a mission, a sense of purpose, your fear really does go away. i've experienced that with a video camera in combat. >> it's one thing when an area is hit unexpectedly, but yesterday i was watching somebody jet skiing. >> i saw -- >> jet skiing. >> morons. >> and now the cops are trying to, you know, and first responders when you put them in like literally unnecessarily dangerous positions, i think that's the most because of what you just said. because these people are so selfless. they don't get paid millions of dollars to do what they do, they do it because it's in them. >> and willie, you talked about the front of a building falling off. >> yeah. >> and the firemen immediately turning and running straight in.

>> and that building in chelsea, someone shouted from across the street posted on youtube, what strikes you is, one second there's a front of a building, next second it's gone, looks like a doll house, and you can see a collection of firefighters not even discussing what to do, but just running into the building instinctively. that's an instinct they have. >> we lost hundreds of firemen on 9/11 because they did exactly that. >> let's talk about difficult jobs, obviously, the most difficult of jobs we obviously met you through war. and you're writing in your work there. this weekend more u.s. troops being shot and killed by people who are supposed to be their allies. it seems to me as horrific as the job was when you were there, it seems that now it's becoming even more deadly, even more dangerous because you never know when the allies that you were training are going to turn their guns on you and kill you.

>> i can't imagine. i mean combat's bad enough when you know who the enemy is. and when you're looking over your shoulder, at the person standing next to you, i mean, wondering if they're going to shoot you, i can't imagine. i think part of that is a deliberate strategy by the taliban, they're infiltrating the a.n.a., and some of it is the friction of ten years of sort of uneasy partnership and some real cultural misunderstandings with them and with us. and frankly, i think the afghans are getting really -- this isn't what's causing those murders, but i think the afghans are getting really nervous about us leaving because it's going to be a very tough scene for them. there's sort of no good answer. >> it's going to get ugly, right? that's the thing, we can't stay there. >> no. >> but at the same time, when we leave -- >> putting up a departure's not going to change, it's going to happen. >> it's going to be ugly

regardless 2014 or 2024. >> yeah. that's probably right. and we're getting blamed for things while we're there. damned if you do, damned if you don't. >> thank you for coming in. >> my pleasure. coming up, david letterman plays to an empty audience and still manages to get big laughs next on "morning joe." [ male announcer ] free windows 8 training from your son. can you help me with something? nope! good talk. [ male announcer ] or free windows 8 training when you buy a computer at staples. another way staples makes it easier to upgrade.

well, it was a tough night last night, obviously. but there were a few laughs thanks to jimmy fallon and david letterman both performing in new york city, doing their shows, but without audiences. they didn't want to put people in harm's way so they told the audience members to stay home, sent them back to the hotels and did their show with no audience. i think it worked strangely. >> we felt like we would be putting the audience at jeopardy if they had to sit through the show. and i said, hell, we've been doing that for 30 years. >> look out. >> 30 years. i got up this morning, turned on the radio and listened for the talk show closings, i have no luck. >> talk show closings. >> talk show closing. >> that's a play on -- >> wait a minute, i think i hear people banging at the door of

the theater demanding to come in. wait a minute, we don't want to miss this. the storm has stopped the presidential campaign so at least some good has come of it. all right. stop it. all right. that's fine. >> it's always fun going whoo! i'm that guy. >> okay. >> power outages could break -- wreak havoc on election day, but don't worry republicans have backup crooked voting machines. >> wow. that's one for the books, baby. that is one for the books. >> dave, we turn to you. >> absolutely. >> up next, what if anything did we learn today?

welcome back to "morning joe," time to talk about what we learned today. and mika, we learned an awful lot. obviously about this storm and the impact of it all.

mike bloomberg's having a press conference later on today. >> following the aftermath throughout the day on msnbc, and i think a moratorium on insulting bill karins. >> i think a moratorium. i thought yesterday, willie, was interesting, the mayor said, you know, stay inside, read a good book. >> yeah. >> go through your rare stamp collection. >> yeah. >> rummage through antiqueties, priceless artifacts. >> from the mingh dynasty. >> don't go outside -- >> do what new yorkers do. >> it's what they do. >> bill, seriously -- >> with sandy. >> we're done with the worst of it. the cleanup will try to begin late this afternoon. we can't see how bad the damage is to the jersey shore, long island, connecticut, we'll see that this afternoon. >> i learned this man is an iron man, truly, he's been up for 48

hours doing a great job. thanks for keeping on top of it, bill. that fire's still burning in breezy point out in queens, we'll keep a close eye on that. something like 50, at least 50 homes burned to the ground and still burning. >> mike, what did you learn? >> i learned i continually constantly and have for years and reminded again yesterday, we all ought to stand in awe of people who do their jobs. we're surrounded by people in washington who don't do their job and we see in evidence yesterday in this city and other cities of people who do their jobs. >> exactly. >> chris jansing, every bit as an iron person. >> yeah, 11:00 to 5:00. >> and northeastern governors get -- >> yeah, they do. all the first responders out there, whether we're talking about the firemen that ran into the buildings, the police officers -- >> nurses and doctors. >> an extraordinary job.